Five transformative alleyway proposals will be built in four downtown alleyways this month. Presented by the American Institute of Architects, AIA, Tennessee and River City Company, Passageways is a program designed to reimagine alleyways as a place for public use and enjoyment in our urban fabric versus forgotten and overlooked spaces between buildings.
In late spring of this year, an international call was released to architects, designers and artists to propose transformative alleyways ideas that could be in place for up to one year and foster community use. Nearly 70 total submissions were received with 24 international submissions from places like China, Japan, India and Brazil along with 19 U.S. submissions and 23 submissions from Tennessee teams.
“The caliber and breadth of submissions received were exciting and made the job of the juries, both a local stakeholder group and a panel of architects from the US, very difficult,” said Jared Hueter, chairman of the AIA-Tennessee Convention, co-director of Passsageways and architect at Cogent Studio. “These installations will provide something very special to our city, and I’m excited for this year’s AIA-Tennessee Convention theme of ‘Impact’ to be a reality.”
The selected winners and the location of their installations are:
· Neural Alley (New York City) – an interactive, pixelated display of the Tennessee River at 729 Broad Street.
· Stargaze (New York City) – large scale, star like beacons suspended above the alley and mimicking star behavior through a link to the Star API provided by NASA at 715 Market Street.
· Stage Genies (Chattanooga) – a soundscape installation that will detect movement and respond with sound at 715 Market Street.
· Urban Chandelier (Sydney, Australia) – a canopy of 6,000 reflective styrene triangles that will create visible light patterns at 711 Cherry Street.
· Grass Garden Inversion (Chattanooga) – a suspended network of bamboo creating interesting visual play and sound at 720 Cherry Street.
The winning installations will be unveiled to the public on Wednesday, Aug. 24, from 5:30-8:30 p.m. at Party in the Passageways. This event is free, open to the public and party goers will stroll through the alleyways enjoying music, a performance by the Chattanooga Ballet and interactive art projects. Local beer from Odd Story Brewing Company, Hutton and Smith Brewing Company and Chattanooga Brewing Company will be featured in the alleyways along with light hors d’oeuvres from The Bitter Alibi and seating from CBI Chattanooga. The party begins in Miller Plaza, and tickets can be secured at partyinthepassageways.eventbrite.com.
“This kick-off event will be a first in many community centered events to happen in the Passageways spaces,” said Amy Donahue, director of Marketing and Communication for River City Company. “River City is committed to programming these spaces for up to a year to show how they can be community hubs in Downtown.”
In addition to River City Company and AIA Tennessee, Passageways partners include The Benwood Foundation, The Lyndhurst Foundation, Cogent Studio, Causeway, Mozilla, the National Science Foundation, Tennessee Valley Federal Credit Union and ArtsBuild. Passageways is a community outreach project of the 2016 AIA Tennessee State Convention to be held in Chattanooga Aug. 24-26.